


The Accords Were Signed

by darkgaaraluver



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, I'm counting it as, M/M, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Tony Angst, Tony-centric, that last ones barely mentioned but I've always wanted to use it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-24
Updated: 2018-07-24
Packaged: 2019-06-15 09:47:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15410238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkgaaraluver/pseuds/darkgaaraluver
Summary: The Civil war is over but Tony can't stop torturing himself over it. He got what he wanted but at what cost?





	The Accords Were Signed

**Author's Note:**

> This was written right after I saw civil war and was going to become a much, much longer piece that ended in Tony/Steve/Bucky because I had a lot of feels. However, consequent marvel films killed my motivation for it and now it's just a sad Tony piece because I love torturing my favorite Avenger.

The Accords were signed. The verdict was still out on whether that was a good thing or not. 

 

Tony sits in his lab with his head in his hands and thanks a god he doesn’t believe in for Natasha. As soon as the audio had cut when he’d been talking to Sam Natasha knew something was up. She’d followed him.

 

Tony still remembered his blinding fury, the way he’d seen nothing but red and a target. The feel of Bucky’s metal hand trying to rip his reactor straight from his chest, the staggering pure FEAR that ran through him at the thought of losing it, forgetting for a second that it wasn’t keeping him alive anymore. Only to forget the next second when Steve was ramming his shield edge first into it. Even though he’d gotten up from that his anger had cooled at his terror. At the sickness he could feel rising up his throat. He never wanted to know what it’d be like to see the man he loved slamming his beloved and iconic shield into a thing he sometimes couldn’t believe wasn’t keeping him alive anymore. How close it could have been to slamming into his neck instead. He tried to tell himself at night that the fact it hadn’t meant Steve still maybe cared for him a little. Somewhere. Maybe. 

 

Tony tried to keep the rising wall of emotion at bay as he turned to a freaked out and winded Bucky. He’d come too far to back down now. He’d lost everything. The least he could do was the right thing by his parents. By his mother. He grit his teeth and raised his repulser. He only had the one shot left but he’d make it count. He didn’t make it count. Natasha had shown up at the last second. Stuck him with a numbing agent to the neck. He went down heavy. Tony’s head rang and his eyes glazed over with tears he told himself were correlated. He missed most of Natasha’s words to the others. They seemed to have leveled Steve a bit though. He’d lowered his fists. 

 

Steve went and grabbed Bucky’s arm to help stabilize him. “You’re right. Give us some time. We’ll think of something, I promise.” 

 

Natasha had nodded firmly once in agreement, a muscle in her jaw spasming almost unnoticeably as she clenched her teeth. It was almost enough to make Tony wonder. Wonder if she actually cared. Wonder if she was worried about them after all. Wonder how much she had seen.

 

Suddenly Tony had been unable to take it. To take watching Steve limp away from him, supporting his best friend, the man who’d killed his parents, his mother. How could Steve still be carrying that shield in his other hand? 

 

He’s still not sure why exactly he’d said what he had next. Was it entirely as noble as he’d made it sound? Was it entirely because of his parents? The mockery that he’d be carrying his father’s murderer in one arm and the shield his father had made him in his other? Or was some part of Tony hoping he’d stay? Would turn. 

 

He didn’t know what he was thinking as he shouted after him. “That shield doesn’t belong to you. You don’t deserve it! My father made that shield.”

 

Steve had paused. He’d sighed heavily before he’d turned around. Had looked over his shoulder and glanced into his eyes before swinging the shield onto the ground with a piercing ring that echoed in the metal building as it hit the ice. It had sounded like an end. The dead look in his eyes had felt like one. 

 

He remembers Natasha picking up the shield with a concerned look and turning to talk to him but not hearing a word. His world faded to black. 

 

Tony grits his teeth and bites back the tears he doesn’t need right now. Steve had come back. He had. Tony had ended up in a med bay for weeks. Even though Natasha had gotten him out of there he’d already gone into shock from his injuries. He had re-broken his arm along with several ribs, including a sternum fracture, and a severe concussion. He was lucky none of his vital organs had been damaged. He’d still needed surgery for it and was in and out of consciousness for a while. 

 

Steve had broken everyone out of jail. And he’d left. Tony was in the hospital still when he had come back. They couldn’t think of any other options. They agreed to sign the Accords on the condition that none of them be charged with criminal offenses and be allowed to go free with the exception of Bucky Barnes who was to get a fair trial open to the public. And so the Accords were signed. Tony couldn’t help but think they’d been signed in blood.

 

And now here he was. In his lab. His last day in the hospital Natasha had picked him up so she could tell him what was going on. When she had finished filling him in she had just looked at him for a minute before she’d said his name. Just his name. It was filled with a lot of things. But Tony knew what she meant. Steve needed his help. 

 

So he was here. Looking up all the information on Bucky’s time as the Winter Soldier as he could find. And now he was bent over his work table trying not to cry for the hundredth time. Stark men were made of Iron. His father would kill him if he could see him now. 

 

Tony didn’t have to glance out of the corner of his eye to the shield in the corner to see it behind his eyelids. He didn’t have to look at pictures to see Bucky’s terrified and guilty face. He didn’t need any reminders to see Steve. Any permutation of Steve. His determined face, his guilty face, his face when he was breaking Tony. Tony didn’t want it, didn’t need it. Didn’t need the ability to see them the way he did the void of space in his nightmares. The way he saw the Avengers death. And he knew even if the original scene had been imposed on him by his own subconscious and Wanda’s powers it’d been right. This was all Tony’s fault. He should have done something differently. Anything. 

 

After all the countless hours and days of no sleep and living on caffeine pouring over all the Winter Soldiers files. He knew. He knew it hadn’t been Bucky that had actually killed his parents. Had known all along really, but had been blinded by the video on constant loop in his brain. Blinded by anger and a betrayal that cut more sharply than anything really had in awhile. 

He’d found a video. A video of Bucky getting his mind wiped. One of the first few times. They’d documented it for future research. As Tony watched Bucky scream and scream around his mouth guard, his entire body straining in unimaginable pain Tony had hurt with him. And he’d realized. Had allowed himself to realize. He wouldn’t ever let himself forget again. 

 

He poured everything into it. Into freeing Bucky. All of the heart he was no longer sure he had. When he testified at the trial he hadn’t slept in a least a week. He wore his sunglasses inside to hide how red his eyes were, how big the bags under them. He didn’t make eye contact with anyone. He made sure to use big hand gestures so no one could see how much his hands were shaking. Everyone’s eyes felt like they were digging through to his soul. When it was done and Bucky freed he slid out a side door and tried to tell himself it wasn’t running. That he hadn’t seen Bucky’s astonished face. Like Bucky was surprised to be let go, like he didn’t think he’d DESERVE it. Or Steve running up to Bucky and wrapping him in a hug full of over-abounding happiness and relief. 

 

He didn’t sleep that night. He sat in his workshop and forced himself to watch Bucky scream on repeat into the small hours of the night. JARVIS wasn’t there to stop him and FRIDAY didn’t care enough to.

  
  
  
  


Tony wasn’t sure what he was doing when the call came through. He really wasn’t. He knew Bucky’s terms were being decided on today. Vaguely. Somewhere in the back of his mind where his conscience had been screaming at him since he’d jarred awake at his work station after an hour of nightmares sometime that may have been this morning. Had screamed at him that this was it. Bucky and the teams entire future rested on today. They could still ruin Bucky and the team forever with this. And it would be his fault. His research. His project His father started. His living nightmare. His conscience that screamed and screamed and he couldn't make himself contact anyone or turn on a TV. Hadn’t been able to since his testimony. Every time he’d been tempted he’d catch the video of Bucky playing on loop on his wall, finally silenced by FRIDAY When he’d passed out. And his hands would start shaking. He had no right to talk to anyone, didn’t deserve it. He had no idea how he’d react to any judgment.  

 

Eventually he’d taken to science. But it was all a blur. A mad rush of equations and blue holograms. And an accented voice that he’d called JARVIS half a dozen times by now. As the time wore later and later the frantic movements and thoughts had slowed until he was staring off into the blue light of a projection and imagining the tesseract, the reactor, the spear, the blue swirling in the depths of mad eyes…

 

He was jerked back into awareness by FRIDAY. “Sir, you have an urgent incoming video call from King T’Challa.”

 

Tony blinked rapidly a couple of times to bring himself back into focus and scrubbed a hand through his hair with a sigh. “Bring it up FRIDAY.” 

 

T’Challa’s face appeared in front of him, projecting up from his desk, superimposed on the holograms he’d been staring into for the last however long. Tony was tired and jittery and anxious but T’Challa’s face seemed to settle something in the pit of his stomach even as his panic threatened to overwhelm him. Because T’Challa had been on his side. Had been one of the few to stand with him. Had not blamed him even as he deserved it. And yeah, he’d been busy grieving over his own loss. But it still had to count for something. T’Challa had been acting as the liaison between Tony and the rest of the Avengers. Even Natasha hadn’t contacted him since asking for his help. Presumably trying to make up with Steve. With Rhodey still mostly in the hospital and Pepper not talking to him T’Challa had been the only human Tony’d talked to in over a month.

 

T’Challa’s face was extremely serious when it came up, but as he took in Tony’s appearance he failed to hide his concern. “Tony. Barnes’ terms have been decided on. Why weren’t you at the meeting? Are you well?” 

 

Tony knew he looked like shit. He was covered in grease all over his clothes and embedded into his skin, coating his hair from when he’d brush his hands through it. All over his chest where he’d run his hands, tap his fingers looking for a bit of metal that wasn’t there. He could feel how swollen and bloodshot his eyes were without even looking. He felt faint and shaky and even under the grease and oil he could see his skin had taken on a pale, gray tint. He huffed out a laugh with the beginnings of a smile and ran a hand through his hair yet again, trying to make it seem casual instead of nervous, while his eyes darted over T’Challa’s left shoulder toward the video playing on his wall. “I’m fine. Why would I show up anyway? And far as I and everyone else should be concerned my involvement with this is over. Imagine for a second I did show up hmm? You really think this is a situation I should be a part of?”

 

T’Challa’s face took on a look of understanding that was the last thing Tony wanted to see. T’Challa seemed to sense this and sighed. “Tony. Whether you like it or not this will always concern you now. You are necessary to the terms they’ve agreed on.”

 

“What do the terms have to do with me?” It may have come out snappier and meaner than Tony 

would have liked, but he couldn’t help it. It felt torn from his throat.

 

T’Challa’s voice seemed to soften in response. “He’s been issued mandatory therapy and rehabilitation. But as an enhanced human he needs another enhanced human to look after him. On top of that he and the Avengers petitioned to keep him as an active member. Now that General Ross has been taken off the project thanks to your evidence about how he handled the Hulk the motion was put through with little fight. Both of these things together means that Steve was the clear choice of person to assign to look after Barnes. But… After everything Steve’s done both with and without Barnes, the UN can’t trust him to do it unsupervised. But they ran into the same issue they had with Barnes. The only people who can really deal with enhanced people is other enhanced people. No one’s sure of anyone anymore. The only enhanced person the UN trusts to look after their interests right now is...You.”

 

Tony’s stomach sunk and his anxiety reached peak levels as T’Challa kept talking. Now he could only stare at T’Challa in shock. He barely heard himself past the roaring in his ears when he let out a little, “What?”

 

T’Challa’s eyebrows drew together. “It was decided that both Steve and Barnes are to live with you at Stark tower and be under your supervision at all times. Steve will remain acting leader of the Avengers but you will act as the Avenger’s liaison to the UN. The others fought this, giving statements about how you, Steve, and Barnes fought in Siberia, but the UN refused to move. However, it was decided that all of the Avengers would now be stationed at Stark tower to promote teamwork and keep the three of you from fighting. Not everyone will live there permanently, technically only Barnes and Steve are mandated to stay there, but I believe several will be.”

 

The rushing in Tony’s ears didn’t stop, the shock was still coursing through his body, but he was suddenly overcome with a nearly blinding rage. And he stood up so fast he knocked his chair over and had to fight back a dizzy spell as he loomed over his desk and T’Challa’s screen. “WHY DOES IT HAVE TO BE ME?! WHY IS THIS MY PROBLEM?! THEY TURNED THEMSELVES IN! I SHOULD BE DONE WITH THIS! DONE WITH THEM! THEY TRIED TO KILL ME! HELL, I TRIED TO KILL HIM! I testified at his trial! I helped them! I helped EVERYONE! Why can’t everyone just LEAVE. ME. ALONE!”Tony banged his fist as hard as he could on the metal counter, making the whole table shake. He kept a piercing gaze on T’Challa, but as they looked at each other his anger seemed to drain a bit into an empty hollow in the pit of his stomach.

 

“It seems to me, Tony Stark, that you are alone.” T’Challa said it in calmly and Tony deflated even more as he wilted onto his desk. T’Challa’s tone softened. “There’s nothing that can be done now. It’s been decided. You’d do well to prepare.” T’Challa let out one more sigh and the screen went dark before disappearing.

 

Now that no one was watching Tony collapse to his knees and then backward until he was sitting on the floor, his head in his hands. As his self-hatred and pain crashed down on him he knew what he had to do. He forced his hands down off his face and addressed FRIDAY. 

 

“FRIDAY, volume on.” 

 

Bucky Barnes’ stifled screams filled the room once again. One of Tony’s hands digging into his sternum, the other scratching red lines down his face. His eyes wet.

  
  



End file.
